Riding high on a stronger economy, President Barack Obama is setting out on a US tour to highlight the improved numbers, with hopes that his approval rating follows suit. A newly elected Congress led by Obama's Republican opponents and forthcoming 2016 elections mean a combative year lies ahead where hot-button topics such as energy and health care are concerned.
But on the economic front, things are on the up and up, and Obama isn't afraid to say so.
"Pick any metric that you want - America's resurgence is real. We are better off," Obama said at a year-end press conference, before leaving for vacation in Hawaii.
Amid a recession in Japan and a near-stall in the eurozone, the world's largest economy is posting healthy results.
US growth surged to its highest level in 11 years in the third quarter with a five-percent increase in the gross domestic product (GDP) between July and September, the Commerce Department said at the end of 2014. Unemployment is below the six percent mark and consumer confidence is at its highest level in nearly seven years.
It is against this backdrop that Obama embarks Wednesday on a series of stops in a ramp-up to his January 20 State of the Union address, in which the president sets forth his priorities for the coming year.
The president will deliver remarks Wednesday at a Ford assembly plant in Wayne, Michigan, where he plans to highlight the "resurgent" US automotive and manufacturing sectors.
At a high school in Phoenix, Arizona on Thursday, Obama will announce new measures to help more people "achieve the American dream of owning a home."
And on Friday, the president will make remarks at a university in Knoxville, Tennessee, about education and vocational training. Obama has seen a slight rebound in popularity seemingly linked to improved employment figures, as well as executive actions to overhaul aspects of America's immigration system and US plans to restore diplomatic ties with Cuba.
His approval rating had long hovered near the 40 percent mark. But according to the latest Gallup poll, Obama's job approval recently came in at 48 percent, the highest since August 2013.
In an interview with The Detroit News published Wednesday, the president highlighted decisions he took in the first weeks of his White House tenure in 2009 that allowed US auto manufacturers to "get back in the game."
Obama noted that he chose to rescue Chrysler in March 2009, despite the objections of his advisers who pressed for focusing only on GM and Ford. The decision saved thousands of jobs.
Over the last several months, the White House has tirelessly emphasized Obama's decisions upon arriving in office six years ago, when the economy was in an upheaval.
"He had to make some pretty politically unpopular decisions to rescue the American economy," said White House spokesman Josh Earnest.